Not looking at articles that friends email me (in order to get me worked up and fire back profanity laced replies usually referencing the bodily fluids he wants to leave in his mother)...

Not looking into the new "Old Republic" game (which does look fairly bad assed)...

Even trying to avoid the re-release of Phantom Menace in 3D...

But when that bearded jackhole comes out to insult the intelligence of every star wars fan out there, then I must simply object...

While speaking to the Hollywood Reporter last week (in an effort to try and get his base excited for the release of Episode I in 3D), Lucas made the case that Han Solo never shot Greedo first:

“… The controversy over who shot first, Greedo or Han Solo, in Episode IV, what I did was try to clean up the confusion, but obviously it upset people because they wanted Solo [who seemed to be the one who shot first in the original] to be a cold-blooded killer, but he actually isn’t. It had been done in all close-ups and it was confusing about who did what to whom. I put a little wider shot in there that made it clear that Greedo is the one who shot first, but everyone wanted to think that Han shot first, because they wanted to think that he actually just gunned him down."

Now, as much as I would like to leave Lucas to his revisionist nonsense, in this instance I cannot...

It is one thing to insert celebrations of the fall of the Empire on new worlds not known when Jedi came out or to CGI Hayden "can’t act out of a wet paper bag" Christiansen (both moves, mind you, I defended)...

It’s a whole different matter to recreate the lore of perhaps one of Sci-Fi's strongest characters.

So let's settle this one and for all...

Here, for those of you not familiar is the way Lucas envisions all of this going down... note how on marker 00:54 Cap'n Solo seems to freeze in time for the splitest of seconds while a phantom blaster shot (presumably coming from Greedo's blaster) barely miss his head. He then return fire from his concealed blaster, killing poor shoots for shit Greedo dead and leaving Solo- righteous in his self-defense- to leave from the Cantina and towards his destiny.

Now here is the way it was originally seen by millions of fan boys:

Note how at marker 00:57, there is no awkward freeze frame Han but rather a single explosion coming from Han’s hidden blaster taking out Greedo.

Seems a little more natural, right?

Now when you take that and combine it with the fact that in the original screen play for the movie, Lucas wrote this:

Tough to argue with one’s own words, ain’t it (there are also claims on the internet [claims, I might add, I have not been able to verify for myself but there are enough of them to make me notice] that in the novelization of Episode IV: A New Hope which Lucas himself penned Han “sneakily shoots Greedo from under the table to avoid the bounty hunter bringing him to Jabba).

But just cause it’s written, does it matter???

Greedo will always shoot first…

We all know why Lucas made Greedo shoot first… and, as much as we fan boys would like to believe it is because he likes hearing us complain (which, judging by the comments he made to the New York Times while promoting the bomb Red Tails, is the last thing he wanted to hear).

It’s because you can’t market a murderer.

In the original movie, Han Solo was a space pirate, smuggler, and all around scoundrel.

Not your proto-typical hero mold in the least.

But then, as the franchise went on, he became General Solo, loyalist to the Rebellion and beau of the fair Princess Leia.

You can’t have the father of the Future of the budding Republic be a guy who had to shoot his way past a bounty hunter who got the drop on him, tossing a few shekels to the bar keep for the slimy mess he is leaving behind.

It’s the same reason we never hear about the legion of slaves George Washington had…

Our heroes cannot be so flawed…

And cold blooded killer (which Solo clearly was intended to be in the original vision of his character) is one that cannot be overlooked.

Lucas has been changing the reality of Solo shooting first since the original rerelease of this film, and he has every right to…

It’s his movie.

And as much as I would like to complain about this singular change to the canon, after sitting through the steaming pile of shit that was Episode I: The Phantom Menace, the plodding, made for a tween love story that Anakin and Padme made us suffer through, and – of course- flying R2-D2, it has become clear to me that Lucas really doesn’t take this shit serious anymore.

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What Do You Think

Gay Marriage....

Is too important an issue for the Government to leave to the hands of the people... Should be a state's rights issue where the voice of the people will be heard... Isn't going to matter a hill of beans once the Chinese roll their tanks down the Pacific Coast Highway...